Earlier this week, Need to Know brought you the story of Michael Mann, the influential climatologist who is being investigated by the Virginia attorney general for fraud. Mann called the case “criminal harassment.” Now, he talks with Need to Know’s Alison Stewart about what he calls the climate change denial “industry,” and the dangerous precedent the Virginia attorney general’s case could set.

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Comments

[...] podcast was produced by Need to Know as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. [...]

Carol Sancarlos

There is global warming.Common sense and SCIENCE FACTS.I wish Dr.Michael Mann the best in his defense of the deterioration of the environment by the greed of corporate ventures for profit.

Alexandra Barreno

It’s amazing who people choose to go after. But Dr. Mann will prevail because he is truthful and his research is based on facts. Good luck Dr. Mann, and thank-you for standing up for what you believe in and being an advocate for the earth.

Snapple

I have voted Republican for 40 years, and I voted for Ken Cuccinelli; but now I see that Virginia’s Attorney General is persecuting the famous climate scientist Dr. Michael Mann on trumped-up fraud charges. I deeply regret my ignorant vote.

I noticed on the Internet that Virginia’s Attorney General Cuccinelli’s father used to be an executive at the American Gas Association–the lobby for the gas industry.

The elder Cuccinelli worked in the Division of Marketing Services according to this March 1986 Oak Ridge National Laboratory document. (See page 78 “#118 Kenneth Cuccinelli” on the External Distribution list for this document.)

Currently the father is an executive at Quest Fore Strategic Marketing, an advertising, marketing, and communications company with offices in Pittsburg, Cleveland, and Washington D.C.

According to the biographical information about the elder Cuccinelli:

When he joined Quest Fore in 1999 as chairman, Ken brought with him a wealth of strategic marketing experience. A former head of marketing for a Fortune 500 company (CNG Pittsburgh), Ken was named 1994 Gas Marketing executive and also served as chief operating officer of CNG Energy prior to joining Quest Fore. In addition to his chairman duties, he also serves as president of International Business Ventures LLC, a worldwide consulting and prospect development company that is active in Europe and Latin America. In 2005, Ken earned his ABC (Business Communications Accreditation) from the International Association of Business Communicators.

Attorney General Cuccinelli’s opponent in the AG race, Steve Shannon, says that Cuccinelli got 55,000 dollars from his political sugar daddy, the mysterious Florida criminal “Bobby Thompson,” around the time that Cuccinelli tried to put Virginia’s Office of Consumer Affairs under the authority of the Attorney General’s office.

Cuccinelli is making a big deal about the safety of abortion clinics, but perhaps the Attorney General got money from the mysterious Florida criminal “Bobby Thompson” to put the Office of Consumer Affairs under the AG’s office in order to protect the fossil fuel interests, not the health of women.

Cuccinelli doesn’t really care about safety and health issues or he would not mislead people about the dangers of global warming. I am not pro-abortion, but abortion is a safe proceedure (for the woman). It is certainly a lot safer (for the woman) than global warming.

I think that the abortion “safety” issue is just a red herring to disguise the real motives for putting Virginia’s Office of Consumer Affairs under the authority of the Attorney General.

Climate denialists like Cuccinelli are spreading what used to be the party line of the Russian petrostate, which spreads global warming denialist propaganda to protect its gas industry. Until the horrific forest fires in Russia this summer, the Kremlin-financed media claimed that our “greedy” scientists were trying to trick people with the “hoax” of global warming.

This summer, our great scientists at NASA were helping the Russians find their forest fires, so the Russians stopped characterizing our scientists greedy liars. President Medvedev recently affirmed in RIA Novosti that global warming is real. Last winter, however, Medvedev claimed that global warming was some “some kind of tricky campaign made up by some commercial structures to promote their business projects.” For the moment, President Medvedev has changed his tune about the “tricky campaign” of global warming.

I think that investigative journalists and the authorities should look into the Cuccinelli family’s financial interests because I think there may be a conflict of interest. I think Attorney General Cuccinelli is probably using his AG office to advance his family’s financial interests. To paraphrase Medvedev, I think global warming denialism is some “some kind of tricky campaign made up by some commercial structures to promote their business projects.”

According to the Union of Concerned Scientists, “Cuccinelli falsely maintains [in his July 13, 2010 court filing] that climate scientists are primarily motivated by money, and suggests they are skewing their research results to attract grants.”

Well, I think the truth may be that Cuccinelli’s family is getting money from domestic and foreign fossil fuel businesses. After all, his father was a lobbyist for the American Gas Association in marketing. The elder Cuccinelli’s new company is probably also getting paid to promote the interests of domestic and foreign fossil fuel companies because the elder Cuccinelli is touted in his biography as an expert in gas marketing.

Attorney General Cuccinelli tries to discredit Dr. Mann and get him in trouble for submitting fraudulent information in order to get government research grants, but Cuccinelli is probably the one who is using taxpayer money to perpetrate a fraud.

Cuccinelli has been spreading the same propaganda about our “greedy scientists” as the Kremlin, which depends heavily on its profits from the natural gas industry. Russia’s President Medvedev is the former CEO of Russia’s natural gas company GAZPROM.

Who will investigate Virginia’s Attorney General?

I know that the FBI investigated Congressman Weldon because he was a shill for the Russian gas company ITERA, and Weldon’s daughter got 500,000 dollars from ITERA for “consulting fees.” I think the FBI should also investigate how Cuccinelli’s family profits from the gas industry. I think Attorney General Cuccinelli is the greedy “moneybags,” not the college professor Dr. Mann and the other climate scientists who work in government and academia.

Cuccinelli seems to have hijacked the AG office and is using it for his family’s financial benefit. He is using my tax money to persecute the great climate scientist Dr. Mann on trumped-up fraud charges. It is disgusting, immoral, and perhaps illegal.

Attorney General Cuccinelli is Catholic, and the Vatican has asked the U.N. to fight global warming. Students in Catholic educational institutions read about global warming in their science textbooks because it is good science and because Christians are supposed to be stewards of the earth and protect God’s creation. Are science teachers in Catholic educational institutions teaching lies about global warming? Is the Pope also a greedy liar who is perpetrating a hoax?

Perhaps Cuccinelli would like to use his power to force Virginia’s public schools to teach the fossil fuel-inspired junk science about the “hoax” of global warming; but Catholic educational institutions will continue to teach the science of global warming, not the propaganda spread by Kremlin moneybags and the fossil fuel industry’s political operatives.

Snapple

Here is a link that will have links to document the information and quotes in my post.

Need to Know is a production of Creative News Group (CNG) in association with WNET. Marc Rosenwasser is Executive Producer. Need to Know is made possible by Bernard and Irene Schwartz, Mutual of America, Citi Foundation, John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Foundation, Margaret A. Cargill Foundation, The Corporation for Public Broadcasting and PBS.